A domain’s DMARC policy contains instructions for email receivers on how to handle emails that fail email authentication checks. The DMARC policy can specify three possible actions for failed emails: none, quarantine, and reject. DMARC policy at “reject” significantly minimizes the risk of domain abuse, brand impersonation, phishing, and spoofing attacks.
A DMARC policy serves three primary purposes – the enforcement of email authentication protocols, establishing a reporting mechanism and protecting your emails against attacks.
Your DMARC policy can protect you against a wide range of email-based attacks on your domain name. Email is the easiest way to use your brand for fraud. By impersonating your brand, hackers can send malicious phishing emails to your own employees and customers. This compromises security in your organization, and seriously harms your reputation.
Enabling a DMARC policy for your domain acts as a shield against these email security breaches orchestrated by cybercriminals.
You need an enforced DMARC policy at your organization to:
The available DMARC policy options are none, quarantine, and reject, depending on the level of DMARC enforcement you want to opt for. Here, p is the parameter that specifies DMARC policy:
DMARC policy none (p=none) is a relaxed DMARC policy that is implemented during the initial implementation stages of DMARC to monitor email activities. It doesn’t provide any level of protection against cyberattacks.
Example: v=DMARC1; p=none; rua=mailto:[email protected];
The quarantine policy (p=quarantine) provides some level of protection as the domain owner can prompt the receiver to roll back emails into the spam folder to review later in case of DMARC fail.
Finally, the reject DMARC policy (p=reject) ensures that emails that fail authentication for DMARC are rejected and discarded by the receiver’s MTA, thereby providing max enforcement.
Example: v=DMARC1; p=reject; rua=mailto:[email protected];
Step 2:
Create a DMARC record using our DMARC record generator tool. Make sure you fill in the DMARC p= parameter to define your DMARC policy like in the example blow:
v=DMARC1; pct=100; p=reject; rua=mailto:[email protected];
Step 3:
Publish this record on your DNS
The DMARC policy you use depends on the level of enforcement you desire and the purpose your policy will serve. Here are a few ways you can leverage your DMARC policy and its subsequent uses:
A DMARC p=reject policy is the only DMARC policy that is effective in preventing spoofing attacks. This is because DMARC reject blocks unauthorized emails from reaching your receiver’s inbox, thereby stopping them from accepting, opening, and reading bad emails.
No. Simply implementing a DMARC policy is not enough as a proper reporting mechanism and maintenance is required as well. PowerDMARC ensures that all of that is handled in the background.
PowerDMARC’s extensive reporting mechanism offers 7 views and filtering mechanisms for your DMARC Aggregate reports on the DMARC analyzer dashboard to effectively monitor your email channels while on DMARC none.
Our hosted DMARC feature allows you to update your DMARC policy modes, shift to p=reject and monitor your protocol effectively and in real-time without entering your DNS management console.
Our 24-hour active support team helps orchestrate a smooth transition from a relaxed to an enforced DMARC policy so as to maximize your security while ensuring deliverability.
You should be wary of any syntax errors while setting up your record to make sure that your protocol functions correctly.
Errors while configuring the DMARC policy are common and can be avoided by using a DMARC checker tool.
If you configure a DMARC reject policy, but set up your subdomain policies to none, you will not be able to achieve compliance on all your outbound emails.
Start your email security journey with a DMARC policy that suits your company’s needs!
